Joker 2's Historic Second Weekend Box Office Drop Deserves A Closer Look

To say that things have gone poorly for "Joker: Folie a Deux" would be putting it mildly. Director Todd Phillips' follow-up to 2019's smash hit "Joker" has been nothing shy of a colossal flop in the early going. The latest DC Comics adaptation was rejected by critics and audiences alike on opening weekend, leaving its financial future on shaky ground. But after the movie's second weekend in theaters, it's safe to say the situation has gone from very bad to much, much worse as "Joker 2" suffered a historic second-weekend drop, plummeting nearly 82% in its second frame.

Phillips' sequel made just $7 million as the unrated, gory slasher "Terrifier 3" topped the charts with more than $18 million. That is a catastrophic result given that "Folie a Deux" opened with an already disastrous $37.8 million the weekend prior. It's so bad that "Beetlejuice Beetlejuice" performed equally well on its sixth weekend in theaters, also pulling in $7 million. The two films will be vying for third and fourth place, respectively, depending on how the final numbers shake out. Either way, it's a trainwreck in the making for all involved in "Joker 2," and it only gets worse the deeper we dive into the numbers.

Just to provide more context, only two other movies have ever dropped more than 80% on their second weekend after making more than $30 million on their opening weekend. The first was 2009's "Friday the 13th" remake, which opened to $40.5 million before tumbling more than 80% in weekend two with a $7.9 million haul. The difference? That was a reasonably budgeted slasher that pulled in $91.5 million worldwide against a $19 million budget. The drop didn't matter nearly as much.

The only other time it happened was more recently when "Halloween Ends" dropped 80% in its second weekend in 2022. Facing competition from "Smile" and "Terrifier 2" at the time, it went from $40 million on weekend one to $8 million in weekend two — almost identical to "Friday the 13th." The difference is that "Halloween Ends" was also streaming on Peacock, which made it easy to watch at home.

The same can't be said for "Joker: Folie a Deux," which is playing on more than 4,100 screens in North America, with a VOD and streaming release on Max set to come at a later date. Financially speaking, there's virtually no way for the streaming revenue to make up the difference at this point. To date, the sequel has made just $165.3 million worldwide, including a lousy $51.6 million domestically. It will be very lucky to get to $65 million when all's said and done. Thanks to the terrible reviews, the film has fallen all over the world; it also dropped 71% overseas this past weekend. It's that bad. International audiences will not save this one.

The first "Joker" cost just $60 million to produce and made more than $1 billion worldwide. It became an Oscar-winning phenomenon along the way. Unfortunately, the sequel carries a budget in the $200 million range, making this record-breaking drop sting all the more severely. Had WB and Phillips budgeted the sequel more responsibly, the situation would be disappointing, yes, but not ruinous. But make no mistake: There is no way to spin this situation as it exists as anything other than dire.

Things are only going to get worse from here as "Smile 2" hits theaters this upcoming weekend, and its prospects are good. Theaters are going to need screens for that one, and they are going to drop "Joker" like a rock. From there, WB will have to just shift to VOD and hope for the best. But given the downright terrible word of mouth, the audience is going to be limited. In short, the studio is going to lose a fortune on this one, putting even more pressure on the forthcoming reboot of the DC Universe, which begins next year. All eyes are now on James Gunn's "Superman." No pressure!

We spoke more about the calamity of the "Joker 2" second weekend box office drop on today's episode of the /Film Daily podcast, which you can listen to below:

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"Joker: Folie a Deux" is in theaters now.